Novosibirsk researchers work on ways to use drones in the Arctic

Researchers from the Novosibirsk-based Institute of Petroleum Geology and Geophysics of the Russian Academy of Sciences' Siberian Branch are working on methods and algorithms for using drones in the Arctic. Head of the institute's field team Alexei Fage told TASS that using drones in the Arctic would be much cheaper than using aircraft or helicopters.

"We need to address certain issues in this region. Using large aircraft for aerial surveys would be too expensive; this would cost millions of rubles. But a drone can be used cheaply to survey the precise areas we need. This is why we are working on algorithms for using drones in the Arctic," Fage said.

These drones must be big enough to survive strong Arctic winds. In 2016, the institute researchers used a drone with a wingspan of some 2.5 meters to survey the area of the Ostrov Samoilovsky research station in the Lena River delta. Drone photographs of about 32 square kilometers have been used to compile a high resolution aerial image of the area, on which you can clearly see various parts of the terrain.

"Monitoring is one of our tasks there, which is why we need to conduct an aerial survey every year. We plan to use drones for this purpose next season, after which we'll be able to decide on the methods of using drones in this environment," Fage said.

The Arctic research station Ostrov Samoilovsky (Samoilovsky Island) was established in the Lena River delta in 2013, TASS writes. It is a Russian-German project launched for geological, biological and environmental studies in the Arctic.